Organ transplant bill passed

Health Desk: 10 January 2018: Parliament today passed the Transplantation of Human Organs Bill, 2018 with a provision of 3 years of imprisonment or Tk 10 lakh fine or both for violation of the law in a bid to check the illegal trade of human organs.

Health minister Mohammad Nasim placed the bill before the House.

The House with Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury in the chair passed the bill by voice votes rejecting the amendment motions forwarded by the opposition lawmakers.

While placing the bill, Nasim said the law is aimed at improving the country's health care services keeping consistency with the advancement of medical science.

According to the bill, no hospital can conduct human organ transplantation in the country without government's approval while the public hospitals having specialized units in this regard can do the job without taking prior approval.

Any organ transplantable to the human body, including kidney, liver, bone, eye, heart, lung and tissue, could be transplanted after their collection from human bodies having heartbeats or inactive with life support for transplantation purpose according to the law.

Organ donation is the donation of biological tissue or an organ of the human body from a living or dead person to a living recipient who needs a transplantation.